Category: Books Page 1 of 6

A STRUGGLE THAT HAS MODERN RELEVANCE

I really enjoyed reading “The Fall of the House of Dixie” written by   Bruce Levine and published by Random House. It combines a succinct account of the origins and course of the American Civil War of 1861 to 1865, with a deeper examination of public opinion in Confederacy.

The range of opinion in the states that  permitted slavery, was wide.

 Indeed four “slave states”, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware and   Missouri never left the Union at all.. President Lincoln was keen to keep these states in the Union and that is why he did not abolish slavery in these states until the end of the War, whereas he liberated slaves elsewhere on 1 January 1863.

The most radical Southern advocates of leaving the Union to preserve slavery , were to be found in the Deep South, notably South Carolina ,whose state forces fired the first shot of the War.

Other more northerly states, like Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas, initially declined to join the Confederacy until forced to take sides by the course of events

During my five years closely observing US politics as EU Ambassador in Washington, I noted that, even to this day, these latter states tend to have a more moderate political stance than Deep South states.

Even within parts of states, voting patterns dating back to the stance taken in the Civil War, persist to this day eg in Eastern Tennessee

The “Deep South” states produced cotton and other crops, using a Plantation System, which would not have been workable without slave labour. The other states had other options.

A majority of the white population in the Confederate states did not own slaves, but slaves made up a significant share of the wealth of those who did, which explains why this section of the white population went to such lengths to protect slavery.

 As the slave trade had been abolished in 1808, slaves were valuable in financial terms. Slave owning was profitable. Poor whites , on the other hand, were driven into badly paid casual work because of competition from the slave system.

Why did non slave owning whites fight so hard to protect slavery?  

I think this can be partly explained by an almost religious sense of racial superiority, and by a fear of loss of relative status ,if slaves became free.

The condition of slaves was appalling. Slaves were whipped by their masters for transgressions.

 In practice many of them could not marry, because a husband could be sold to a different owner to the one that bought his wife.

In some states, slaves were forbidden to be educated. Even to this day, there is a lack of investment in  basic education in some of the former Confederate States.

The deep racism that underlay slavery came to light when, towards the end of the war, manpower for the Confederate Army was scarce.  An Irish general in the Confederate Army, Patrick Cleburne, proposed that Blacks be recruited to Confederate Army in return for being freed of slavery.

The Confederate War Department rejected the proposal on the grounds that Black people would not be suitable for military service on grounds of  “natural dullness, cowardice and indolence”. This was  racist ideological rubbish , as shown by the exceptional bravery of the Black Americans who fought in the Union Army. Black soldiers in the Union Army, if captured, were likely to be executed in defiance of the conventions of war.

 In the end, very few were recruited, to the Confederate forces, largely because the promise of liberation was confined to the soldier himself, and not to his wife and children.

What happened to the liberated slaves after the war was over?

This question is not explored as fully  in this book as I would have liked. In Georgia, a large part of the confiscated land in the state was allocated by Union General William Sherman to be given  in 40 acre holding to former slaves.

 But in other places, the confiscated land was sold off, at a discount, to speculators from the North. Elsewhere the ex slaves were left to their own devices.

Indeed an attempt was made to reintroduce elements of slavery through so called “black codes” which restricted free movement, and wage bargaining by ex slaves.

There is one issue , very topical today, which is touched on briefly….voting rights for African Americans.

In an impromptu speech, delivered just  after the War had ended, President Lincoln suggested that the newly liberated African Americans might be given the right to vote. One of the people in the audience for that speech was John Wilkes Booth, an actor . On hearing this suggestion, Booth immediately set about plotting to murder President Lincoln, an enterprise  which unfortunately he completed successfully.

As I said at the outset, this is an excellent book. It relies on private correspondence, as well as public statements,  to gain insights into public opinion in the Confederacy.

I have just finished reading two very well written biographies of Conservative Prime Ministers, Neville Chamberlain and Edward Heath, the first of whom held Prime Ministerial office in the 1930’s and the latter in the 1970’s. 

“Neville Chamberlain’s legacy…Hitler , Munich and the path to war”  was written by Nicholas Milton, published by Pen and Sword.

The other book is an autobiography , and is entitled “The Course of My life “ and is by  Edward Heath, and published  in 1998 by Hodder and Stoughton.

Chamberlain and Heath’s political lives span the entire period of British history from 1920 to 2000, and the two books are a good introduction to this long period of British history, and show how the priorities ( and “philosophy”) of a major political party  adapts to changed circumstances.

CHAMBERLAIN

Neville Chamberlain is, of course, remembered for his attempts to find a modus vivendi with Hitler by forcing Czechoslovak territorial concessions. But there was much more to Chamberlain than this.

He was Minister for Health in the 1920s, and was responsible for initiating a huge programme of social housing. 

He introduced Widows Pensions.

 He was a “Levelling up “ Prime Minister , who actually did some levelling up. 

He was not impeded in this by any free market dogma. He had been a local councillor and Mayor in Birmingham before entering the House of Commons, and had seen poverty at first hand. 

He was no pacifist. As Chancellor of the Exchequer, after the 1936 General Election, he imposed a 3p in the £ income tax increase to pay for more defence spending, particularly of aircraft. This investment proved important in the Battle of Britain.

But when it came to negotiating for peace, Chamberlain failed to understand Hitler, who was a gambler and utterly reckless. Chamberlain acted towards Hitler as if he was a normal calculating politician. 

Chamberlains did buy significant extra time for British rearmament by appeasing Hitler in 1938.

 The ”Irish Times” wrote in September 1938 of this that Chamberlain 

“had done more than any other individual save mankind from another war”.

The paper added that this had required great courage. De Valera also admired Chamberlains policy in 1938.

If Chamberlain’s political life is to be evaluated on the basis of whether he achieved his goal, which was peace in Europe, he failed, and the failure was sadly evident to him before his death in 1940.

HEATH

The great goal of Edward Heath’s political life also was peace in Europe. Heath sought to reach that goal by bringing the UK into the European Union, which he saw as a structure of peace in Europe, binding countries so closely together  economically that they could never contemplate war with one another. 

Fortunately for Edward Heath , he did not live to see  his work  partly undone, when the UK  voted to leave the EU in the 2016 Referendum. He had died in 2005.

Edward Heath was an excellent writer,  and his autobiography keeps the reader’s attention over its full 736 pages. 

He gives a good account of his personal life.

He was brought up in a semi detached house on the Kent coast. His father was a qualified carpenter who made a living as a small builder. 

Edward Heath became an undergraduate in Oxford University before the War, on the basis of his academic results. While there he became active in college politics, and in the student Conservative Party. 

As a student politician, he opposed Chamberlains appeasement politics in 1938, having observed Hitlers Nuremberg Rally in person. 

The book gives an entertaining account of Heath’s search for a parliamentary seat after the War,  in which he  had served bravely.

He gives an entertaining account of his conversations with different constituency associations.

 One association wanted an assurance that he would reply to all correspondence personally , and in longhand, as the previous MP had done. Heath would not give that assurance, so he had to look elsewhere.

Another wanted an MP who might become a Minister. 

This  seat was Bexley in Kent, just on the eastern edge of London. He was elected to serve that constituency in the General Election of 1950. Heath served it loyally as its MP. And Bexley remained loyal to him too, despite his public differences with the leadership of Margaret Thatcher.

Heath devotes much of the book to his work in negotiating British entry to the EU. 

 He points out that the true political nature of the EU was set out for the British people. It was not presented as just an economic arrangement. This was done before their Parliament voted to join the EU and the people approved it on this basis in a referendum in 1975.  They were not misled at the time of that referendum, as Brexiters tried to argue in 2016.

Heath  gives his version of the difficult relationship he had with Margaret Thatcher. 

Early in their career they had much in common, and were good friends. It is a pity she did not find an opportunity to bring him back into government at some stage after she replaced him as leader of the Party in 1977.  On the other hand he may have expected too much too soon. 

 The breach between them, and their philosophies remains unhealed, with the Thatcher version of conservatism ultimately triumphant. 

The title of the Chamberlain book suggests the book would reveal Chamberlain’s “legacy.” It does not do so. 

My own assessment is that the actual legacy of Chamberlain’s efforts to avoid a Second World War was to give any form of “appeasement”  a bad name. The perceived failure of what is called appeasement in 1938 has led to mistakes by British and American leaders negotiating with dictators since then…..for example by making the wrong assumption that Saddam Hussein had weapons  of mass destructionin 1991 , when he did not,  and  then going to war on that  false basis. 

Hitler may not have been bluffing in 1938, but Saddam WAS bluffing in 1991.

Both Prime Ministers has outside hobbies which helped them keep their minds relaxed despite the pressures of Prime Ministerial office. 

In Chamberlains case, his interests were angling, birdwatching and the study of moths and butterflies. 

In Heath’s case, his outside interests were music and sailing, in both of which he reached a very high standard.

IRELAND

The Chamberlain book deals very slightly with his relations with Ireland. 

He settled the economic war in 1938, on financial terms that were favourable to Ireland, something that is forgotten in Ireland. 

He also gave Ireland back the Treaty ports, which enabled Ireland to remain neutral in the war. 

These  two very important developments are not explored in the book.

In his book, Edward Heath devotes a chapter to Ireland. 

He approved the introduction of internment without trial  by the Stormont  government. This was justified that juries would be intimidated because juries would be intimidated. He seems to have given insufficient thought, then or since, to the outworking of this radical decision. He did not explore alternatives.

On the other hand, he was the first UK Prime Minister to say that the UK had no selfish interest in Ireland. He was the first UK PM to visit this state , when he met Liam Cosgrave in Baldonnel in 1973. Earlier Britsh PMs, in the previous 50 years, had expected their Irish counterpart to go to London.

He sought to negotiate a settlement to the conflict in the Agreement reached at Sunningdale.  He claimed  that , at Sunningdale in 1973, Liam Cosgrave lacked the courage to  promise to hold a referendum to remove Articles 2 and 3 of the Constitution.  These Articles included a territorial claim by Dublin to rule Northern Ireland. This was to be  a price  paid for setting up a Council of Ireland, with consultative functions. 

Given that partition had been accepted in practice by Dublin as early as 1925, this territorial claim should never have been inserted in the Irish Constitution in 1937.  But once it was there, removing it was bound to be divisive. 

Heath seemed to have forgotten that Cosgrave headed a coalition government, and that some of his  strong minded Ministers were quite nationalistic. The main opposition party, Fianna Fail, was even more nationalistic. The risk of defeat in such a Referendum, and a resulting government split , was vey very high. 

Lack of courage was the last thing of which Liam Cosgrave could be accused..

This shows that even enlightened British leaders sometimes have a poor understanding of Ireland. 

 “Peril” by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, published by Simon and Schuster, is an account of the last year of the outgoing Trump Administration, and the first year of the Biden Administration.

It is full of atmospheric detail, but lacks analysis and an easy to follow and coherent narrative.

I found the background to the rushed US and allied exit from Afghanistan revealing, but also incomplete.

I was in Washington, as EU Ambassador,  in 2009 when President Obama announced to assembled Ambassadors that he planned to dramatically increase US troop presence in the country….. to initiate the  so called “Surge” .

 Obama was motivated by a desire to strengthen  the US global military position, and also to make Afghanistan  human rights respecting democracy.

 It seemed over ambitious to me at the time, in light of the very recent  US failure to achieve similar goals in Iraq.

“Peril” tells us that Obama’s vice President at the time, Joe Biden, was totally opposed to the Surge. But Hillary Clinton, Secretary Gates and the generals prevailed. The Surge went ahead.

 When President Trump took over, he wanted to get US troops out of Afghanistan as quickly as possible. But inertia , and lack of focus on his part,  meant that he never actually did it.  It fell to Biden to implement  this part of the Trump agenda ( just as he follows the Trump agenda on China).

 The actual withdrawal was a botched job, and Afghans who had loyally served the allies were abandoned.  Woodward and Costa offer no explanations for this.

The book does offer an insight into Biden’s style of negotiation with Congress. He is tough and relentless in his pursuit of detail. He was, and is, determined to put money in the pockets of working class Americans . He has been so good at this that his Stimulus Bills may have contributed to demand led inflation in the US.

Did Donald Trump’s contribution to inciting violence, and   to the attempt to overturn the vote of the people, add up to a crime for which he could be convicted in a court of law?

I believe the answer is to be found in the speech made by Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate leader, after the second attempt to impeach Trump had failed.

Describing what happened on 6 January as a “disgrace” and an “act of terrorism”, he said

“There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible “

but added

 “by the strict criminal standard, the President’s speech probably was not incitement”.

Donal Trump, after all he has done, still leads the Republican polls.

The peril to American democracy comes from kindly, decent Americans, who are putting cultural and party loyalty , ahead of the interests of democracy in America.

I have just reread “Revolutionary Iran, a history of the Islamic Republic” by the late Michael Axworthy, who was a leading expert on Iran in the UK Foreign Office.

Iran is home to one of the world’s oldest civilizations. Its population is well educated and instinctively pro Western.  70% of Iranians said in an opinion poll a few years back that they would favour better relations with the West.

The terrorists who attacked the US on 9/11 came from America’s ally Saudi Arabia, and not from Iran.

 Yet it is Iran than has had to endure the most severe western trade and investment sanctions over the last 30 years, while Saudi Arabia is courted assiduously by both Trump and Biden Administrations.

Iran was supportive of the US in the wake of 9/11, and allowed US planes to over fly Iran during initial US actions  against the Taliban in Afghanistan  who were sheltering the 9/11 terrorists. Yet President Bush included Iran in the “axis of Evil”  in the speech he gave in response to 9/11. I do not understand why he did this.

This   negative US attitude to Iran may be due to the fact that Israel has developed back channels for cooperation with the Saudis,  while the Iran/Israel relationship is marked by enduring hostility. But the US should consider itself free to develop its own foreign policy without always adopting the Israeli view. In any event, the Israeli position has not been consistent. Israel helped Iran in its decade long war with Iraq.

The policy of sanctioning Iran dates back to legislation passed by the US Congress in 1996, and has become ever more severe since then.

 When one looks at the failure of US sanctions in changing the politics of Cuba, and the continuing failure of US sanctions against Iran, one must question the efficacy of sanctions as  a diplomatic tool.

In recent times the Iranian regime has indeed become more and more oppressive, with liberal us of execution as a means of dealing with opposition.

 But there have been times when the Iranian leadership was open to compromise. Khatami and Rafsanjani were open to compromise, but these opportunities were not taken up in any sustained way by western governments. In the early years after the Islamic revolution, election were somehat free and fair, but the 2009 elections were rigged.

There is a long standing democratic tradition in Iran, dating back to the democratic constitution of 1906.

Unfortunately that 1906 constitution was overthrown in 1908 by the then Shah, with help from the Russians and the British, who felt they could more easily do business with an autocratic regime. A similar exercise in supressing Iranian democracy was undertaken by the last Shah with aid of the British and the Americans in the 1950s. Again the outsiders felt they could get better access to Iranian oil from autocrats than from democrats.

Axworthy deals extensively with long and  bloody war that followed from an Iraqi attack on Iran.

This book filled a major gap in my knowledge of the Middle East, and I recommend it.

I have just finished reading a book with the above title by Stephen Collins, the noted columnist with the “Irish Times”.

It tells the story of how Irish governments led by Enda Kenny, Leo Varadkar and Miceal Martin,  dealt with fall out from the UK decision to leave the EU. There are so many twists and turns in the narrative that a summary is impossible within the scope of a short review. 

The Irish Foreign Minister at the time of the Brexit Referendum in 2016 was Charles Flanagan, and he reacted to the decision with commendable speed and thoroughness.

 He briefed his counterparts in all 26 remaining EU states about Ireland concerns, namely that of keeping the border open between the two parts of the island and preserving the Republic’s position as a full member of the EU Single Market. This laid the foundation of the consistent support Ireland has had for its position from all the EU institutions.

One political figure who does not emerge with much credit from Collins’ account is the current leader of the UK Labour Party, Keir Starmer. 

In her final days as Prime Minister, Theresa May tried to assemble a majority in Parliament for  deal that would have kept the entire UK in the EU Customs Union, thereby mitigating or removing the need for customs post either in  ports, or on the land border. For this, she needed the support or abstention of the opposition Labour Party. 

As Stephen Collins puts it

“ Corbyn was relatively open the deal, but Keir Starmer, who was in theory strongly pro EU, raised obstacles at every turn .”

This was the last chance of a soft Brexit.  Defeating the Tories took a higher priority for Starmer than preserving good international relations. The story does not create much confidence about the level of responsibility one can expect from a Labour government in the UK.

I have just greatly enjoyed reading Douglas Hurd’s book

 “ Choose your weapons….the British Foreign Secretary , 200 years of Argument , Success and Failure”.

Hurd has had a distinguished career,  including as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. He is an excellent writer. He combines historical analysis with vivid sketches of political personalities.

Published in 2010, this book shows how the life experiences and assumptions of successive Foreign Secretaries influence the content and outcome of diplomatic policies.

There is a tension , throughout this long period , between two views of how Britain should conduct itself in its relations with its European neighbours.

One view was that the UK should seek to create , and take part in a structure of consultation which would help preserve peace in Europe.

The best exponent of this approach was an Irishman, originally an MP in the pre Union Irish Parliament, Lord Castlereagh.  He helped to ensure that a defeated France was not humiliated in 1815. Arguably his work  in the Congress of Vienna and afterwards helped preserve relative peace in Europe until 1914.

The other view was that the UK should be somewhat more isolationist, intervening to promote liberal causes,  but not becoming entangled in Europe. Lord Palmerston was the best exponent of this approach. There were others who were less flamboyant.

Some figures that are forgotten today get due notice in this book.

The role of Ernest Bevin in helping found NATO,  and thereby committing the US to the defence of Europe,  is recalled and is very relevant to events today , and to the peace of Europe for the last 70 years.

Another figure who get deserved recognition is Austen Chamberlain, the author of the Locarno Pact which reintegrated Germany into good relations with its neighbours and could have kept peace in Europe but for the economic crash and the rise of Hitler in the 1930’s.  

Unlike his half brother, Neville, Austen warned of the danger of Hitler before any other British leader, including Churchill.

The relative economic power of Britain peaked around 1870 and was in slow decline thereafter. But the fact that so many parts of the world were still coloured pink on the map as part of the British Empire led some statesmen to overestimate British power.

In the earlier periods the Foreign Secretary made policy under mild supervision from the Prime Minister. Nowadays the Prime Minister is more central, but a lot depends on personalities.

Anthony Eden was a good and methodical Foreign Secretary , who became a bad Prime Minister , because he had no strong Foreign Secretary to restrain him over Suez.

The UK today is isolating itself in a dangerous way. It is conversing with itself , rather than with its neighbours . None of the statesmen chronicled in this book would have allowed that to happen.